February 26, 2007 in Photography by Mark Levison

Like many other readers of this blog I’ve been look for a good head to head comparison of Apple’s Aperture vs. Adobe’s Lightroom. I make the comparison myself but I have neither the time nor a Mac of my own. So the notes on this page merely represent what I’ve learned from others.

Hands down the best work is coming from a pair of O’Reilly Digital Media Bloggers: Micah Walter and Michael Clark. Micah is an Aperture user trying Lightroom for 10 days, Michael is a Lightroom user trying Aperture. Between them they’re starting to paint a very interesting comparison. BTW Spend the time to read the comments they add alot of extra information.


from Micah:

from Michael:

Aperture Pros:

  • Browser display more metadata than Lightroom
  • You
    can make adjustments to your images at anytime – without having to
    switch to the Develop module (via the Heads up Display). Several people
    (David Medina among them) make final changes when view the images in
    the contact sheet.
  • Light table
  • Can stack with a collection (collections are just virtual groupings of pictures). This seems like a pretty minor limitation. I would like to know how this would be really useful.
  • Better color profile support
  • Support dual screens
  • Black, Gray and White point settings.

Lightroom pros:

  • Doesn’t require a new Mac ($$$$)
  • Can import all of my existing tagging information from Photoshop Elements (yes I’ve been slumming it for the past few years).
  • Can assign standard metadata to every image on import
  • Presets – a bunch come stock and you can find many more on the web.
  • Better spot removal, cloning and healing tool.
  • Faster, Faster, Faster
  • Works well with limited real estate (many users comment that Aperture really wants a 30 inch display or two monitors).
  • Auto-Sync has fewer steps and so is a bit faster than Lift and Stamp to use.

Cool discoveries:

Aperture
seems to have important items in its favour: Light table and the
ability to adjust the image anywhere (not just develop). However I’m
leaning towards Lightroom since I’m not tied to using a Mac forever,
speed and better healing tools.

Which app will you use? Have I missed any good comparisons?

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Wow – to all of Mike’s readers who’ve been flooding in – its great to have you here. Several people have asked for a comparison of Aperture and Lightroom to LightZone: details. Also of interest: Lightroom isn’t a reaction to Aperture.